The Business in Knowledge of Control in Lack of Control in Knowledge

THE BUSINESS IN KNOWLEDGE OF CONTROL IN LACK OF CONTROL IN KNOWLEDGE

In Regards:

Well, I have to laud Republicans on one deal here. Have you ever lauded anyone? I have. I laud where laud is due. I yearn in lauding Republicans and every now and then they do indeed present the rare chance in earning my lauding ways. This unusual occurrence and uncommon event in time is the Republican’s rejection of Iowa Representative, Stevie King to become their party’s leading voice on immigration. I’m sure this was done for political purposes to deem the party more appealing to Hispanics, but it was a smart move. Republicans not only need to appeal more to moderates, but also to up and coming minorities such as Latinos and in general, the overall diverse American populace.

The very day before the decision was made on January 7th, King was out touting that it was in the bag…he was to become the new chairman on the House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration, in which stated but once again, would have made him the Republican’s leading voice on immigration. It was not to be though as the majority leader, John Boehner (R-Ohio), snubbed King choosing instead, Elton Gallegly, a Republican representative from California. It was a good decision, for Gallegly is a much saner individual. The district he represents in California is more than a quarter Hispanic and he is even an outspoken animal rights activist.

King would have been disastrous. I will only speculate Boehner’s decision in snubbing King, but I bet with bottom dollars that the following King antics might have had something to do with the final choosing:

a)King went out of his way and designed a wall topped with an electrified wire for the sole purpose of keeping illegal immigrants from crossing the border with the asinine stated selling point, “We do that with livestock all the time.”

b)He insists police can sense who is an illegal immigrant simply by noticing indicators such as clothing, accent and the “type of grooming they might have.”

c)Steve King’s stated plan to control immigration carries a double edge for conservatives, for he proposes…“Every time we give amnesty for an illegal alien, we deport a liberal,”...and he wasn't just kidding.

d)During the elections of 2008, King predicted if Obama won, “radical Islamists would be dancing in the streets" and in 2009 accused President Obama of having a “default mechanism” that makes him favor blacks over whites.

e)This past December he proclaimed Joe McCarthy (infamous for purging and sending Americans he deemed un-American to trial during the fifties), as a “hero for America.”

Yepper sports fan, putting King in that type of authority would’ve been a sad state of affairs.

As of late, besides the King shunning, there’s just not much else to report in lauding fashion for Republicans. They’re still calling the new healthcare law a job killing bill with no justification or example; even voted for total repeal in the House. As the benefits of the bill kicks in and Americans are personally being affected by its advantages, polls are moving towards favoring the bill. Earlier polls were a bit deceiving, for one-third of those opposed to the bill were actually liberals who felt it did not go far enough. Of course, Republicans don’t want that to get out. Lest we not forget, one of the last times Republicans swore to repeal any bill beneficial to Americans hurting was the New Deal and once its benefits kicked in, Americans punished Republicans for four straight presidential terms.

Apparently as the ‘Daily Kos’ points out, Republicans are sick and tired of the sick and tired. With the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Michele Malkin and among others, even the right-wing media for cryin’ out loud, blasting an eleven-year-old boy for speaking at a healthcare reform seminar this past March about his mother dying of pulmonary hypertension, emphasizes the lack of sensibility in Republicanism. After losing her medical insurance from her former employ (who laid her off) and could not get other insurance due to her pre-existing condition and unemployment, the boy’s mom passed away. She was 29.

Limbaugh, on his radio show expressed his cynical godly commandment as if the boy was listening, by brashly saying, “Your mom would still have died, because Obamacare doesn’t kick in until 2014.” Beck contemptibly asked, “Where were you when the boy’s mother was vomiting blood? Where was grandma?” I guess Beck felt cute in expressing this toward liberals and the boy. A bit detestable, I think. Where are the tears when really needed, you jerk in pants? Beck cries every time when expressing his dubious patriotism, but mocks jovially when true sorrow occurs from a bereaved little boy in losing his mom. Malkin proclaimed the motherless boy as the “new dubious poster boy for Demcare.”

Even further, when Representative Louise Slaughter (D-NY) testified about an elderly constituent in her district having to wear her deceased sister’s dentures because she could not get insurance nor afford a new pair on her fixed income, Limbaugh retorted, “I’ve read the Constitution, I didn’t see that you have a right to teeth,” then mockingly adds, “I am wearing George Washington’s teeth right now. I’m wearing his teeth. I just like wearing dead people’s teeth.” Wow! That must've taken a big chunk out of his spineless brain to come up with. Finally in typical Limpball crass fashion, he winds up blurting, “If you don’t have any teeth, so what? What’s applesauce for?” These arrogant pitiless sub-folks can only stand for unmoral character mired in the lesser virtue of abhorrence.

In front of (D-Ohio) Representative Mary Jo Kilroy’s office, hordes of Tea Party activists taunted a man with Parkinson’s disease yelling, “If you’re looking for a handout, you’re in the wrong end of town.” Representative Kilroy was still undecided on which way she would cast her vote on healthcare; eventually to their demise, she did vote yes. But her indecision had brought in the throngs of Tea Party and right-wing protesters. They hurled insults at the afflicted man who was for healthcare reform, called him a communist and threw a dollar bill at him.

Perhaps this is why Republican red states have the worst healthcare systems with the unhealthiest Americans. This determined and dead-set refusal to healthcare reform only benefits the insurance industry. Apparently for Republicans, protecting the insurance company’s high profits is far more important than protecting Americans, for as it stands the current 45,000 deaths per year due to lack of insurance, the 98,000 deaths from medical errors and the 62% numbers of personal bankruptcies due strictly to medical costs does not benefit Americans; only the insurers.

Is Mitch McConnell truly representative of the American dream as some boast, when he claims that most Americans do not want healthcare reform that “denies, delays or rations healthcare?” Isn’t that precisely what defines the present USA medical insurer system today? With 94% of the health market monopolized and insurers stating to doctors which medical procedure they will pay for and which ones they will not, along with their indiscriminate premium hikes; isn’t what McConnell crows about against reform, is exactly the definitive mode of operandi in America with insurers at the helm?

SoU Address:

Did ya catch the State of the Union Speech this past Tuesday night? Yes, Obama spoke in broad terms, but you can only cram so much detail into an hour’s airways. It was eloquent and it was uplifting, something this country needs right now. In contrast, Paul Ryan gave a dire future unless cuts in spending, affecting each and every average American, are immediately enacted.

Representative Jeff Flake (R-AZ), interviewed (01/26/2011) on MSNBCs Jansing & Co. blasted Obama for speaking in short term, but praised Ryan’s counter speech for federal wage and discretionary spending that omitted his plan to ax Social Security and gut Medicare. When Christine Jansing pointed out to Flake how he slammed Obama for generalizing, while in the same breath bequeathed Ryan for his generalizing and in omitting his axing plans to Social Security and Medicare, Flake stated that Ryan was speaking in short terms and had no time to divulge in long term Republican goals. Go figure…

Actually, what Ryan spoke of on the issues of spending cuts, he never was specific, but the Tax Policy Center has read and studied his entire plan and they found that the Ryan way will cut taxes for the wealthiest 1% of Americans in half on top of their already tax forgiveness amounting to 117% of the plan’s tax cuts, while raising taxes for the other 95% of America’s population. In addition, Ryan’s plan assumes zero dollar growth in discretionary spending, which will never occur, for it includes federal programs from energy to education to defense to courts.

Republicans are now touting Ryan as their newly obtained property of intellect. There is nothing intelligent in his cutting of the deficit and debt. In fact, it’s simply political maneuvering in rehash by putting a new coat of paint over Newt Gingrich’s failed budget plans of the nineties. Newt’s fiscal ideas never made it to the contribution stage in America’s permanent fiscal policy arena and neither will Ryan’s. Both wanted and want to dismantle Medicare and give vouchers to our seniors to go out and purchase medical insurance on their own. We know how hard that would be, elderly seniors attempting to buy insurance from insurers who screen thirty and even twenty year olds on health conditions before allowing them to purchase a policy. No, I just don’t see much of any of Ryan’s plan becoming law.

Republicans tried to seize an opportunity in downplaying Obama’s speech by pointing out that three Supreme Court justices did not attend the president’s address. They expressed it as a boycott. The three justices are of course the most conservative of the court, in which are Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. Turns out, it was not a concerted boycott effort, but personal commitments. Scalia hasn’t attended a presidential State of the Union speech since the mid-nineties. Alito had a prior commitment to speak and teach in Hawaii and for Thomas, well who knows, he just didn’t attend, though his excuse was based on partisanship. But let’s agree with this, if it ever does come to this point where Supreme Court judges concertedly boycott a president’s speech, they’ve just sealed the deal in politicizing the highest court of the land.

Now Georgia congressman, Paul Broun truly did boycott Obama’s speech and that is fair enough because that is nasty politics, but no less politics and he is a nasty politician and not a judge. His tweeted reason for not attending though is a tad-bit shady. His message: “Mr. President, you don’t believe in the Constitution. You believe in Socialism.” This guy reminds me of school in the summer—no class!

With the two parties crossing the aisles and sitting together, it felt all warm and fuzzy and was a symbolic gesture towards unity. But, in standing together to fight the ills that woe this country, forget it. Representative Darrell Issa (R-Ca), as the new chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has declared all out war on the Obama administration in mounting a vocal offensive calling Obama and his administration as “one of the most corrupt presidencies in modern times.” He has revealed a long laundry list of investigations he will conduct insinuating criminality, which is so bogus. Issa simply wants to play his political hand and attempt to roll back Obama’s achievements. His portfolio of investigations include the Wiki leaks, job creation initiatives, the stimulus bill, the FDA, the EPA, the foreclosure mitigation program and financial regulations. Issa is simply a bomb thrower. He’s not looking for true justice; he’s just attempting to make the Obama administration look bad. When there was just cause to investigate the Bush administration, which couldn’t and wouldn’t account for the Iraqi funds of $12 billion that simply vanished, Issa not only refused to investigate it, he refused to debate it. But now, with this Democrat president, he’s seeking every outlet to look into and has enlisted corporate CEOs to tell him which regulations they want him to go after that may hinder their unimpeded greed routes. Ya know, the same routes the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission found and blamed American banks, financial institutions and Bush government regulators in causing the worldwide crisis with reckless bets, endorsements of risky subprime mortgage bonds and the explicit overlooking of danger signs…all in the name of self-greed.

Aside from Issa, another investigation has just been concluded, but this one deals with the Bush and Republican era of authority control. It was conducted by the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) and in its findings, it found that Bush’s Office of Political Affairs (OPA), overseen by Karl Rove, was in direct breach of the Hatch Act by using taxpayer’s money for Republican political campaigns. Throughout the Bush administration years, but in particular during the 2006 campaign elections, the OSC reports the OPA was essentially an extension of the Republican National Committee and under the guidance of Rove, created a “target list” of congressional races, organized briefings on taxpayer time and dollars and sent cabinet officials out to campaign at times when the officials should have been conducting official government business. The report also states, “Of the approximately seventy political appointees interviewed by OSC who reported attending political briefings before and after 2005, none took leave to attend them.” Corruption gets what corruption got.

Due to the fact that Bush administration officials involved in the illegal activity may still be influencing current politics (such as Karl Rove being paid by Fox News as a political strategist and consultant), since they have left their official government offices, unfortunately, prosecution cannot be pursued by the OSC.

Now, with this obvious systematic and repeated breach of American law, you’d think that Issa, in a bipartisan effort would pick up where the OSC left off and pursue legal avenues for prosecuting those Bush officials in violating governmental law. After all, he’s earnestly pursuing the Obama administration strictly for law violations right…of course it couldn’t be purely for political measures, right? Issa does have the authority to subpoena Rove and the likes, but he’ll never do it. Talk about wasteful and personal agenda spending of hard working American tax dollars, at the least he could pursue Republicans to reimburse the American taxpayer. Nah, that ain’t going to happen either, for ya see, Issa’s quest is not for American justice; his intent is in becoming an obstacle for Obama policies…more of a Republican way hindrance really, rather than the pursuit of justice in the American way.

Ending in the Rear:

Michelle Bachmann, the Minnesota Republican…a lot could be said here, for she has as of late, still pursued her foot-in-mouth strategies, but since we’re ending now instead of beginning, I’m going to keep it short and not even touch her Tea Party rebuttal to Obama’s State of the Union Speech. In fairness, she appeared as cross-eyed because she didn’t know what camera to stare into. I will reveal this though…during Obama’s speech she leaned over to fellow Republican congresswoman, Jean Schmidt of Ohio and whisked, “He’s absolutely shameless,” in direct contrast of Obama’s theme of civility, bipartisanship and working together in the efforts of America’s causes. Apparently she was rehearsing, for in her Tea Party rebuttal speech, she repeated the shameless phrase.

Nonetheless, I will end with another Bachmann moment. Three days after attending a private Constitution speech by Antonin Scalia hosted by her Tea Party caucus, Bachmann traveled to Des Moines, Iowa to give a lecture of her own about the Constitution to an anti-tax assemblage. Now mind you, this is just after hearing Scalia speak about the Constitution, but in her own self-induced interpretation she issues forth and declares against all grade school history books that our founding fathers, who wrote the Constitution, ended slavery. She even includes John Quincy Adams, who was not a founding father, his father—John Adams was. She belched out that, “Men like John Quincy Adams, who would not rest until slavery was extinguished in the country.” It’s true that slavery did not appeal to John Q. Adams, but as the sixth president he did nothing to quell the practice and he did more than just not rest until slavery was extinguished, he died. Both George Washington and Thomas Jefferson owned human property and Washington, during the Revolutionary War, actually recaptured two slaves captured by the British and had them sent back to their owners. Jefferson not only owned slaves, he bedded down with them. Now mind you, this inept in US history woman is gearing up to run for the presidency. In her thinking, vision and ignorance, it is as if the Civil War never occurred and Abraham Lincoln, who as the first Republican president, never gave the Emancipation Proclamation speech in 1863. Why would he, if our founding fathers had already ended slavery?

Sal Russo, the Tea Party Express czar and the one who picked Bachmann to deliver the Tea Party rebuttal was crucified on MSNBCs Hardball by his own ineptness, after being totally unable to reply to Chris Matthews’ question of do you believe there is any validity on what Bachmann said on the issues of slavery. Russo began to freeze and could not come back with a valid answer or even remark, so instead tried to sheepishly say what she meant was that “we cannot continue to spend money as recklessly,” which of course had not even an inkling of an answer to what the question was. I give Matthews credit, he wasn’t backing down and offered the question to be answered by Russo five more times, but to no avail, Russo had just become a Bachmann foot-in-mouth sacrificial lamb. Matthews was not on a bully pulpit, but he was becoming a bit frustrated at the total disregard to honestly answering the question.

Aw, I don’t know, ya got Republicans rewriting history all over the place—concerning Obama’s birthplace, Bachmann’s slavery, Glenn Beck’s rewrite of Nazi history in stating that Nazism was actually a liberal front and the Republican controlled Texas school board literally rewriting history school books to favor conservative causes. I guess that no matter how well the labels are, even the best of labeling is no match to stupidity.

About Me

Entered the world as Bruce John Anderson. With a dad as Bruce and two John dangrads (grandpas), grandma thought it too confusing, hence the nickname B.J. I've had ever since I was six months old; yet some folks refer to me as simply...The Beej.

Born in Stephenville, Texas on the Sunday morn of 11/09/52 and while growing up in the Fort Worth area, I have a West Texas flair about perception in life. Currently, I’m a misplaced Texan residing in NW Pa. and that is OK, for one Texan is about equal odds to one Yankee state. This ol' Texan does indeed love the snow up here. Snow is about the only thing I know of that can even make a junkyard look pretty.

Graduated: Trinity HS (Euless, TX) in ‘71 and later from The University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) in ‘84 with a Bachelors in geology.

Had my first set of children Amber (1971) & Jason (1974) as a young man and my second set Claire (2003) & Paige (2005) I had as an old man. Am married to sweetness in Veronica my wife.

I extol the science disciplines working as a microbiologist, geophysicist, chemist & geologist.

Work has taken me into 39 countries. It’s amazing witnessing firsthand the varying cultures and environs, but prefer the myriad similarities; the old man sitting on a tree stump in front of his central Sudan mud hut was the same old man sitting in his favorite rocker on a West Texas front porch; both just sitting back watching the world go by while pondering it all.

My motto in life is don't take it so seriously, it's not like it's permanent.